Jogging over Distance technology makes it a social experience

by Conrad Quilty-Harper, posted May 14th 2007 at 5:51AM

Technology is inexorably tied to progress, but when it busts into our lives and subtly tells us that we're doing something wrong -- in this case, getting some "us" time on a solo jog -- we've gotta admit to being a little peeved. Even for those who like to share their second most sweaty experience on the day-to-day, this is probably a bit of an overkill. A prototype technology called Jogging over Distance is being developed at the University of Melbourne which uses GPS, cellphone tech, and 3D audio simulation to make it seem as if two joggers from separate cities are actually slogging it out together. The advantage over just whipping out a cellphone is that as one runner goes faster, their voice appears to be coming from further ahead to the other runner, which could presumably help motivation. To each their own we suppose, but we'd take some loud music over the grunts of a fellow jogger any day. Or, indeed, a form of motivation that helps us -- no, forces us -- to start jogging in the first place.

[Via textually]

Filed under: Misc

Tags: Exercise, GPS, Jogging, Prototype, Running

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Neutral

earthling @ May 14th 2007 8:23AM

doppler, gps, and voip.. yay, no wait, howcome the other guys is pulling away, doesn't he have a hill to job up as well?

Trying to sync two joggers in two cities when no two cities are alike is just .. well its obvious. It would make a cool social project however for a fund raising relay race, or perhaps passing the virtual torch. Everyone could track the current runner, urge them on, and when they reached their destination another runner could take off on their stint. 10 runners, 10 cities, 100km virtual relay that would be cool.